Coronavirus: China toll reaches 425 Three more Asian countries confirm cases; Hong Kong sees first death due to epidemic Virus: China allows entry to US experts
Beijing, Feb. 4: Three more Asian countries confirmed coronavirus infections on Tuesday among citizens who had not travelled to China, as Hong Kong reported its first death from the disease and millions more people in Chinese cities were ordered to stay indoors.
The toll in mainland China soared to 425 after
64 more people died, the biggest single day tally since the first fatalities emerged last month.
The virus has continued to spread with Singapore, Malaysia, and Thailand on Tuesday reporting new infections that were not imported from China.
The death of a 39-yearold man in Hong Kong came as the semiautonomous city closed all but two land crossings with the Chinese mainland.
Singapore announced its first four cases of people being infected locally, bringing the total number of infections in the citystate to 24.
Macau, China’s semiautonomous gambling hub that is popular with mainland Chinese visitors, decided to temporarily close all of its casinos for at least two weeks.
China’s Communist leadership made a rare admission of fallibility on Monday, acknowledging “shortcomings and difficulties exposed in the response to the epidemic”.
Belgium reported its first case of a new virus in a person who was repatriated from the Chinese epicentre of the outbreak. However, the health ministry said Tuesday the person was in good health and does not show any symptoms of the disease.
A suspected case of the deadly coronavirus has been detected in Pakistan’s Sindh province in an engineering student who has been quarantined by authorities following his return from China.
In Thailand, two Thai drivers who came into contact with Chinese tourists were among six new cases of coronavirus reported in the kingdom on Tuesday.
Meanwhile, OPEC members and their ally Russia are discussing a further cut to crude oil output at a meeting in Vienna because of China’s coronavirus epidemic, Iraq’s oil ministry said Tuesday.
Beijing: China has agreed to allow U.S. health experts into the country as part of a World Health Organization (WHO) effort to help fight the fastspreading coronavirus, as the number of cases and deaths continued to mount, says reports.
In central China’s Hubei province, epicenter of the epidemic, China state TV reported there were 2,345 new cases of the virus and another 64 deaths, bringing the total of virus-related fatalities in Hubei to 414 by Monday.
The White House said on Monday that China had accepted its offer to have U.S. experts as part of a WHO mission to study and help combat the virus that emerged in Hubei’s provincial capital of Wuhan.